@tonyhalsall....right on the money
Nobody taught the Wright Brothers, Nobody taught the Rogallo pioneers how to pilot their creations......leaning the hard way is a highly risky business....sensible pioneers swap experiencesand build up an
EMPIRICAL knowledge -base.....then the regulating authorities decide to take over and that empirical base becomes the starting-point of FORMAL training and safety regimes.
Officialdom has to keep itself in work...you can still teach yourself to sail an inherently unstable high-performance racing dinghy.-not necessarily the BEST way (it can get wet and cold!) but any reasonably intelligent and physically capable person can do it.....unfortunately, the air is not so forgiving and reactions have to be really sharp (or the aircraft inherently "self-righting") in ordre to survive the steep early-learning curve.
The sensible route to self-instruction , is to tap into the world's accumulated wisdom pertaining to the interest in question. Books, when I was younger,-more comprehensive and wider-ranging , we now have the Web.
It would seem the deceased had delusions about his abilities. he was bought down to earth very quickly.
He chose the DIY route and didn't do adequate preparatory learning.
I have NO problem with formal instruction, I do have a problem with some jobsworth organisation decreeing that it is the ONLY fount of knowledge and you WILL follow it's mandated training-regime etc.
License, proving your competence to practice your subject in proximity to other people....no problem with that.
sorry, can't feel sympathy for someone taking a very dodgy gamble.
But I do feel sympathy for those he left behind that miss him.